Block Party Banner 2

I finally completed the weaving-in of ends and border crochet on the banner which was worked on at the late August Downtown Block Party in the RiverWools booth.   In planning this activity, I had in mind  Saori free weaving principles applied to knitting. I created a knitted base varying stitches and colors randomly and using lots of yarn overs to make holes.  Details in this post.

I then packed up a variety of things, ready to invite people to weave and stitch them onto the base fabric: yarns in various colors, thicknesses and textures, felted balls and pompoms, recycled silk sari ribbon and pieces of recycled silk textiles.

Afterwards, my granddaughter and I completed more of the embellishment and I crocheted around the edges twice, one round of single crochet and a round of slip stitch.

The result is a loooooong banner that is now hanging in a perfect spot in my hallway.  Eventually, it will make its way to RiverWools to be displayed, but for now I'd like to live with it for a bit.

This was a lot of fun. The kids at the Block Party enjoyed it a lot and became very engaged. So did I!

)O(

Finger Knitting

 

Still experimenting with tech.
This picture was made on my iPad in the Moleskine app. No way to directly post to blog from the app, so I exported as email, cropped in Photoshop and uploaded through MacJournal.  I could just as easily have manipulated the picture in Photoshop (if I knew how!!) uploaded right in Blogger....but I'm playing now.
I like the way this picture came out. It was an easy way to blur the edges, add text.
The Moleskine app for iPad is free.

Shadows

October is a good month for gathering Shadows, finding those parts of yourself you lost over the years, owning them, honoring them in the dance towards wholeness.

Gathering

A short entry, to test a new way of posting here.

Chestnut Gatherers, by Lacombe
I am gathering many things this month. This painting gives me a wonderful
image for that work.

Trellis

Taaaadaaa!  I did it! I used That Yarn, That Awful Yarn and made something I will really wear.

What I needed was to steep myself in my art voice - think about my aesthetic, the notion I have that I make things to wear in dreams and fairy tales.  Fairy tale thoughts - the themes of the impossible tasks and challenges - make straw into gold, sew a dozen shirts for swans to turn back into brothers.

I very nearly gave myself permission to let this go, but I did that earlier this year with the 2012 International Freeform Challenge, and I have been alternately okay with that decision and filled with regret.

And then I was  in a fairy tale with the challenge of making this loathed yarn into something lovely and having to do it by a certain time. It became important that I complete this, because I knew that doing so would break a spell I've been under, a pattern of too much letting-go, too many unrealized creative dreams.

So, here is Trellis, a fairy tale wrap:

I added two additional yarns, Araucania Liwen, a thick/thin alpaca/wool and Knit One, Crochet Two Sprinkles, a fine glittery green yarn.

With the Liwen, I knitted the shawl on #17 needles, with random yarn overs and random knit and purl stitches.  I made a 3-Square Shawl, though I didn't create the squares in the manner of the one to which I linked. I did put them together in that way. Interesting to me was that the loose, lacy structure of the squares did not result in a pointy middle back when worn, but winds up settling itself in a nice curve, which is the shawl shape I prefer (something about a big arrow pointing at my butt does not appeal to me.)

I had a vision of weaving That Yarn in and out of the lace trellis, so that the fluffy bits would resemble roses (or any flower- too late to be picky.) I had the whole back completed when I stepped back and didn't like the way the pink and white yarn between the fluffy bits was looking. Soooo....I painstakingly pulled all that out and embarked on cutting fluffy bit by fluffy bit, and tying each to the trellis, one by one. Much better.

I then wove the green sprinkles yarn throughout. Its effect is very subtle and does not stand out, but does add to the effect I wanted, I think.

I finished off by crocheting around the edges with the Zen ribbon yarn that was the other yarn I had to use. Into the stitches along the neck and opening edge, I wove a lightly twisted strand of all three embellishing yarns together.

Trellis tied for third place in the contest, and won me something very precious: the energy for future art that comes with successfully completing a challenge and getting my work into the world.



)O(

Little Things

That's all I'm doing lately. Creating little things. Making small gestures.
Playing with rocks and plants and essences.

I'm feeling a great knot within me unwind.
And a greater connection with my inner being.
This is a time of gentle shifting, but deep shifting.
Six and a half years after my son Patrick's death and I feel like I am finally beginning to know who I am now in a world without his living presence.
And, after raising four children, beginning to know the shape of my new life sharing a nest with only my husband.

Much of what I'm doing lately flows from work in Athena Perrakis' Magical Sabbatical. It will overlap with Pixie Campbell's Autumn SouLodge..and at the Winter Solstice I will begin the yearlong Apothecary Circle.

Lots of circles! Lots of shifting...Blessed be!

 a purple dyebath...plain ol' Rit Purple...

 ....and a dozen lovely purple muslin bags...for treasures and medicine and gifts....

 ...my Blue Moon altar charm, made of a moonstone angel and a ceramic bead gifted by a SouLodge sister last year, steeped in the energy of Athena's Blue Moon ritual and a night in its Light, strung on waxed linen with two lapis lazuli beads and sterling spacers...posing with rough lapis lazuli......

....chunks of rough lapis lazuli, which came all covered with white dust (in the left and center parts of the tray), and which, scrubbed and scrubbed (on the right), shows beautifully the intense blue stone and the glittery pyrite....

 ...purple fingernails....

 ....and wanting to make every little thing beautiful, I've covered my matchbox with Hundertwasser (upcycling the images from my tear-off daily calendar)......

....began this collage weeks ago and took it up again just before time to play with essential oils and make potions...it was interesting that I had saved all these elements earlier and they perfectly amped up the energy of potion-making....

 ....lots of the magic coalescing here...these are the petals from the only sunflower that bloomed for me this drought summer, one precious petal and a shard of citrine went into the oil I am calling Ouverture Calme (Calm Opening), a mixture of tangerine, sandalwood and bergamot essential oils in sweet almond oil, all worked on a thick piece of bark I lightly sanded and polished with beeswax.....

..........Ouverture Calme and an as-yet-nameless mix of patchouli/peppermint.... along with a mason jar filled with the dried petals of flowers in my little first-time garden this summer....left outside to steep in glorious Full Harvest Moon  light....

.....THIS Moon, with great magickal circle shimmering around it.... *



*picture credit to my friend Bethany Sweitzer